Jungle Hunt

“Afternoon, Mack.” The man’s voice had a thick layer of cockney in it.

“David.”

“Any problems?”

“Nothing I couldn’t handle.”

The head of Phoenix Force shook his head. “Still say it would have been more prudent to have me with you.”

Bolan smiled. “I wanted to get one man out, David, not bring down the entire slum around me.”

“Fair enough.” David McCarter moved to the passenger door. “This our third passenger?”

“Yup.”

McCarter grinned, a sharklike baring of teeth that was completely devoid of warmth or humor. “You aren’t gonna be any trouble now, are you, mate?”

Staring at the fox-faced Brit, Bernier shook his head. David reached in and relieved him of his sidearm and smartphone. “All right, then, time to go.”

It was on the way to the plane that Bernier got some of his courage back. “Wait a minute. You cannot just take me out of the country—there are rules to this sort of thing. I cannot be extradited like this. I demand to speak to your State Depart…” He trailed off at seeing the wolfish looks on Bolan’s and David’s faces.

“When are these guys gonna learn?” David asked rhetorically.

“I never claimed to be affiliated with the government, U.S. or otherwise.”

Bernier’s face clouded in confusion. “What—are you bounty hunters? Private security? Whatever you’re being paid, I can give you ten times the amount.”

David dropped a firm, unyielding hand on the Brazilian drug lord’s shoulder. “You can just call us troubleshooters, mate. And if you’re not nice and polite on the flight up, you’ll be the trouble we’ll shoot next.”

Thiago Bernier, once a top drug kingpin and mastermind behind a large pipeline that stretched from Rio to Peru and three other continents, allowed himself to be meekly led into the Gulfstream’s interior, searched in more detail and secured to a captain’s chair.

Meanwhile, Bolan contacted their pilot, Jack Grimaldi, and had him get into the takeoff schedule. Thirty minutes later, they were wheels up and off the ground, arrowing into the brilliant blue Brazilian sky.

3

Once Bernier had been settled—with the aid of a mild sedative to relax him—Bolan had planned to take a well-deserved break himself, having been up for the past thirty hours tracking down his leads to the drug lord. McCarter, however, had other plans for him.

“Sorry, mate, but Hal said to call in the moment you got here.” He dropped his rangy form into the cushy leather seat across from Bolan. “You’re lucky I let you have a drink first.”

“Well, I already noticed we’re not heading north.” Bolan gestured with his bottle of water at the sun setting ahead of them. “What’s he got now?”

David shrugged as he held out a sat phone. “No idea—your ears only, apparently. All I know is that I get to babysit Mr. Silk Pants there back to D.C. while you get to jaunt off into the shite again.”

Bolan grinned as he took the receiver. “Too bad there couldn’t be another mission in Rio—preferably on the beach?”

“Oi, mate, wild horses wouldn’t have kept me from that one.” McCarter rose. “I’m gonna go check on our passenger.”

“Thanks.” Bolan waited until David had headed out before connecting to Stony Man Farm, his stateside base of operations. Bounced off several satellites, the tight-beam communication went through multiple encryption layers, rendering it virtually unbreakable. To the rest of the world, Bolan and his contact outside of Washington, D.C., were speaking static-filled gibberish.

“Striker?” Bolan heard a quiet chewing sound and knew Brognola was munching on one of his ever-present antacid tablets.

“I’m here, Hal.”

“How was your fishing trip?”

Bolan grinned. “Not as much time on the beach as I’d wanted, but I landed the big one. David cleaned him up and we’re bringing him home so you can cook him for as long as you want.”

“Excellent. Look, normally I don’t like sending you back out in the field right after the completion of one mission, however, Wonderland’s breathing down my neck on this one, and since you’re already in the area, so to speak…”

“Yeah, it seems I can’t get enough of South America lately. Where’s Jack dropping me off this time?”

“Quito, Ecuador, and from there you’ll be taking a charter plane to Neuva Loja, in the province of Sucumbíos. Ultimately you’ll be heading into the Amazon rainforest, so let me know whatever gear you’ll need that isn’t on the plane and we’ll drop it to you.”

“Okay—what’s going on over there?”

“Part of this—okay, most of this—is the D.C. policy wonks and bureaucrats covering their collective asses. As I’m sure you’re aware, the energy crisis is ramping up again, with oil futures climbing to record levels again and showing no signs of receding anytime soon. With truly effective alternate power sources still slow to come online, efficient use of current fields and discovery of new ones is of paramount importance, not only to our current government, but also to nations around the world.”

No surprise there, Bolan thought. China’s appetite for energy grew larger by the week, with India nipping at its neighbor’s heels, both burgeoning nations contributing to the pall of pollution growing worse in the Far East every day. And that didn’t even count America’s near-insatiable consumption of gasoline—all of which required new sources, preferably not from the Middle East.

“Of course, this has pushed any and all forms of oil exploration to the forefront, with companies able to find and claim the biggest undiscovered fields reaping potential years, maybe even decades of bonanza. Recent explorations indicate sizable oil fields are present in several areas of the Amazonian rainforest, particularly on the border between Ecuador and Colombia. The oil exploration company Sulexco has recently entered into an agreement to measure exactly how much oil may be in the area.”

“I trust that you’re not asking our operatives to babysit oil company executives?” Bolan kept his tone even, but his disdain was evident at the thought of such an assignment.

Brognola snorted. “Hell, no. They’ve hired a private security company to provide corporate protection for its assets. However, despite the U.S. and Ecuador’s warm camaraderie in public, they’ve been making some moves lately that the current administration is not very happy with, including getting very cozy with Iran over the past couple of years.”

Bolan sifted through recent CIA analysis on his smartphone. “Yeah, they’ve been buying weapons from the Middle East, taking billions in deposits, everything but a government sleepover. But why send me to the middle of nowhere? If there’s something to be found, shouldn’t I be starting in the capital?”

“Normally, yes, but the Ecuador-Colombian border is important for a couple other reasons. Although the two countries have recently put an end to their hostilities, things tensed up again in ’08 after a Colombian military action against FARC rebels left twenty dead, and relations between the two countries strained to the breaking point. And I haven’t even mentioned how chummy Ecuador’s president is with Venezuela yet—and we know what Chavez thinks of America. The U.S. wants the oil folks to get their work done smoothly and to ensure that no rogue elements on any side—FARC, the Colombian military, anybody—inflame any tensions that could spark a full-scale war. The idea is to send you down there to keep the peace and head off anything before it makes headlines.”

“And I’m guessing that any intervention by American forces would be seen as the U.S. sticking its nose where it doesn’t belong,” Bolan said.

“Got it in one, Striker. With the Ecuadorian president still clinging to power after an attempted police coup in 2010, State doesn’t want to do any on-the-record poking around down there unless we’re sure folks’re being naughty. That, of course, is where you come in.”

“Of course. Do I have a cover, or am I just supposed to run around the jungle and see who shoots at me first?”

“We’re inserting you using the Cooper alias—you’ve decided to head down and report on the state of the rainforest, find out the real story about oil drilling there, that sort of Pulitzer prize–grabbing material. Your modified jacket’s already on the way and will be in place before you’re on the ground. Once there, I’m sure you’ll root out anything that’s happening soon enough.”

“Fair enough. Give me any updates on the locals from the Agency, and I’ll review them on the way over. South America’s been fun so far—I’m sure Ecuador will be, too.”

“That’s the spirit. With luck you’ll just tour the countryside, and everything will be nice and peaceful.”

“Hal, they wouldn’t be sending me down there if that was the case—you know that.”

“Hey, I can dream, can’t I?” Brognola grumbled. “Just keep your powder and your feet dry, Striker. Call in when you touch down in Neuva Loja. We’ll work out the rest from there.”

“Will do. Striker out.” He’d no sooner disconnected when McCarter stuck his head over the seat.

“Back into it, eh?”